Comparing Forms and Degrees of Critique

Jeremy Keith Ward

doi:10.23987/sts.70247

Abstract

This paper presents an analytical tool designed to evaluate the degree and type of divergence between a dominant orthodox discourse and that of heterodox actors who criticize it. This method of discourse analysis consists in a breaking down and classification of its different parts. It is grounded in Boltanski’s conception of critique and in analytical sociologists’ breaking down of social reality. By summarizing these differences in simple tables, the method proposed greatly facilitates comparisons of the discourses of a great variety of actors. To show the heuristic power of this tool, I apply it to the controversy that emerged in France in 2009-2010 over the safety of the pandemic flu vaccine. I present the social and medical ontologies on which these various critiques are grounded and their varying degrees of radicalism.

Highlights

Today, with the Internet, rumours and conspiracy theories regarding technology and risk are the object of much public attention
I will break down the various forms of critique of the safety of the 2009 pandemic flu vaccine, revealing the ontological disagreements at the core of this controversy
Much so that officials did not mention the safety of the vaccine before the issue made front-page news at the beginning of September 2009. This means that the discourse presented by the defenders of this vaccine was produced in reaction to the critique made public by the media

Summary

Introduction

With the Internet, rumours and conspiracy theories regarding technology and risk are the object of much public attention. The most exotic ones get shared like funny jokes via social networks, mailing lists and conversations around the coffee machine. They are discussed in detail in media pieces to illustrate the purported contemporary crisis of trust in Science and pervasive lack of political literacy (Harambam and Aupers, 2015). Anthropologists have underlined their crucial social significance They have shown that rumours and conspiracy theories are both products of and responses to the fundamental tensions that exist in any given society, and in capitalist and globalized ones in particular (Atlani-Duault and Kendall, 2009; West and Sanders, 2003). Conspiracy theories constitute a specific political repertoire that enables people who lack social resources to voice their discontent with a social and economic system that leaves them politically powerless (Fassin, 2011; Harambam and Aupers, 2015; Atlani-Duault et al, 2015)

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Conclusion